LIFT brings books, literacy resources, and library connections directly to families who are systematically excluded from traditional early literacy programs — reaching them through the community organizations they already trust.
We partner with WIC offices, shelters, housing centers, and early childhood sites to deliver books and resources directly to families — meeting them where they already are.
Age-appropriate books delivered regularly that children can keep and treasure as their own.
Workshops and resources that celebrate parents as their child’s first and most important teacher.
Clear pathways to ongoing library services, resources, and community support.
Community events with local artists, storytellers, and performers who bring reading alive.
Thousands of families face structural barriers that exclude them from early literacy support. These families aren’t unreachable — they’re underserved by systems designed for stability they don’t have.
Housing Instability
Families experiencing homelessness, in shelters or transitional housing, fleeing domestic violence, highly mobile
Institutional Barriers
Undocumented families, families affected by incarceration, foster and kinship caregivers
Digital & Access Barriers
No reliable internet, non-library users, recent immigrants and refugees, young and teen parents
Trauma & Crisis
Families managing multiple crises, time poverty from multiple jobs, temporary custody situations
LIFT is built on a simple truth: families in crisis still want the best for their children. We make early literacy accessible without requiring stability, internet access, or institutional engagement.
No registration, no address required, no digital access needed. If you’re there, you’re eligible.
We work through organizations families already use and trust — WIC offices, shelters, community centers.
Books children keep forever, plus pathways that connect families to ongoing library services.
We don’t assume stability. We design for the real lives families are living right now.
Every child’s path to literacy begins long before the classroom — in everyday moments with the people who care for them most. The toolkit gives parents, grandparents, foster parents, and kinship caregivers practical activities that fit naturally into daily life: at home, on the bus, at the grocery store, at the park.
LIFT succeeds through deep partnerships with organizations families already know and trust — WIC offices, family shelters, public libraries, housing centers, early childhood programs, and community centers.
Washington, DC
Baltimore, MD
Richmond, VA
LIFT succeeds through deep partnerships with organizations families already know and trust — WIC offices, family shelters, public libraries, housing centers, early childhood programs, and community centers.
Washington, DC
Richmond, VA
Baltimore, MD
Let’s bring books and literacy resources to the families you support.
